Goodbye Hello
by annj
Summary: It's not like she missed him. They didn't share an undying love, not even the same interests. But he had somehow touched her without physical contact, leaving behind a piece of her that felt colder without him." --- angst!Dean, vision!Sam
1. Chapter 1

Title: Goodbye Hello - Chapter One 1/3

Rating: PG-13 for cussing and violence

Pairing: Sam, Dean, Cleo (OMC)

Spoiler: Nightshifter

Timeline: shortly after Heart

Wordcount: 3700 this chapter

A/N: Sequel to my story "Hello Goodbye", where Cleo is introduced. Go read it first! This story was inspired by the inkworld saga from Cornelia Funke. My greatest thanks goes to geminigrl as usual. She's a wonderful beta. **sarcasm mode on** Further thanks goes to the english language and the dumb ass guys who invented the comma.**sarcasm mode off** I have no idea how geminigrl manages to bear with the crap I write :-D

Summary: "It's not like she missed him. They didn't share an undying love, not even the same interests. But he had somehow touched her without physical contact, leaving behind a piece of her that felt colder without him."

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Chapter 1

She wasn't really surprised when she saw him standing on the other side of the road.

Shortly after their paths were divided, she'd seen him pretty often. She saw him in the kitchen of the school cafeteria, stirring the soup. She saw him staring through the window of the house he'd lived in. And she saw him bent over a book in the library, intently sucking in the words. But it never was him.

He had vanished from her life faster than he had wriggled his way in. All that were left were memories.

The years made it clear that she'd never see him again, not really. At first she wished, maybe, his father had just decided to make a road trip and they'd come back later. Yeah, sure. A road trip with a seventeen year old boy, who had a piece of wood sticking in his chest.

No, they were like phantoms, hard to grasp like the hazy memory of a dream. He and his family. Like the freaking Ghostbusters coming to the rescue and driving away with screaming sirens when their work was done – well, minus the sirens.

She'd waited for him to come back. To explain everything. To make sense of the abrupt change in her life. After all a dead witch had tried to kill her. That'd make everyone's view of life turn upside down.

Now, after years of uncertainty and waiting, she decided to forget him. Except that now, of all times, his face decided to pop up, and not only in her memory. Only yesterday, she'd missed the bus and came late for work after she'd seen him going into a laundry shop on the other side of the road. She'd been sure, it wasn't him. It never was. But still...

"Stop staring holes in the air. There's a customer waiting."

Cleo blinked, her awareness slamming into her like a 250 pound linebacker. The street in front of the copy shop was bustling. Cars honking and people yelling into their mobiles. A group of college students surrounded one of the copy machines, punching buttons at random and scratching their heads. Well, guys, what do you think is the ON-button for?, she thought sarcastically. Students, The future of our country. Boy, are we in trouble.

She shook her head and threw an apologetic glance to her colleague Ruby. "Sorry," She murmured and turned towards the customer: an old man with a huge stack of letters.

"Tax papers. I need three copies of each... uh, make it four."

It was going to be a long day.

oOoOo

The long day turned out to be even longer than anticipated. It was way past nine and dark outside when Cleo finally closed the shop and walked the two blocks to her apartment. Nervously, she grabbed the small pepper spray in her right hand and the small bottle of holy water in her left.

Damn the day she had learned about monsters. Wasn't it bad enough to be afraid of an average mugging or assault? But no! Now she imagined a demon in every corner, witches in college and vampires in the drive thru. The whole world seemed to consist of supernatural beings.

And the internet didn't help. Everything she'd learned about the world - the supernatural world - she'd learned via the internet. There was , and . It was amazing, how many hits you'd get when googling witch and attack. Then there was this guy from South Dakota she was in contact with from time to time. He told her about the stuff she didn't find in the net. And most of it was stuff she didn't want to know at all.

Yet she read about it. She collected every piece of information about weird deaths and mysterious vanishings. And the numbers weren't exactly comforting. Fortunately, most of the information was just that: information. No personal experience. Still, it didn't make her feel any safer on this particular evening.

New York was never safe. Neither in the bright light of the day, nor in the dingy darkness of its dodgy night life. And especially not if you were a young woman strolling alone after dark through the less prestigious parts of the city.

She fumbled with her keys, trying to find the lock while looking over her shoulders in case anyone stupid enough jumped her from behind. It wouldn't have been the first time. Maybe she should think about moving on campus?

But against all apprehension, she entered her apartment three minutes later, unharmed and surprisingly hungry.

"You're late," her roommate yelled from the kitchen, clanking with the dishes and coming into the hallway, a big bowl of popcorn in her hands. "You missed Sex and the City." Lu announced, munching happily on the sweet snack and dropping pieces of it all over the carpet.

"What a loss?"

"Yeah," Lu said grinning. "They had sex in the pool."

"Awesome." Cleo peeled out of her clothes and sat down on the couch. The T.V. was showing some ads about monthly female problem solvers when a serious looking woman with too much hairspray and too little clothes to cover her up properly started rattling on about the latest news.

Blah, blah, war in the Middle East; blah, blah Bush campaign against poverty and... half of the amount of popcorn in her mouth tumbled out again and she grabbed blindly for the remote to boost the sound.

"... pictures of the responsible. Dean Winchester is momentarily on the run. The police released sketches of the suspect and calls for help. If you've seen..."

The rest of the words were drowned by the rush of blood in her ears and the annoyed voice of her friend.

"What the hell? Have you gone deaf? Turn down the volume!" Cleo pressed the mute button. She didn't need the detailed description. The sketch told everything she needed to know. He looked older, a little bit more harsh, but it was unmistakably Sam's brother.

oOoOo

The grainy picture ended up pinned against the wall above her desktop, framed by newspaper articles, maps of the NY sewer system and a few postcards from her parents' trip to Honolulu last Christmas.

She glanced at it everyday, wishing it to start talking. Of course, it never did. And neither did the television. He seemed to have vanished from earth as well as from the media. She was pretty sure he had done nothing to deserve the negative press, not the man she'd met that night. Still, there were times when she had doubts. Doubts about Sam and his questionable lifestyle, his family and anything that had to do with monsters or demons. She'd never told anyone about it. Not even her mother. Especially because her father seemed to have forgotten or at least dispelled this fateful night seven years ago.

Sometimes, when she had still lived with her parents, she had gone into the cellar, staring at the outlines of the large stain on the cement floor, which had never really disappeared.

Nowadays, a visit to her parents wasn't regular anyway. Christmas and Thanksgiving, sometimes her birthday. It wasn't like she didn't love her parents. She adored them... though she still wished she was a single child. She'd gotten to the realisation her sisters were weird hybrids between gnomes and chaos demons. That would explain their ignorant tendencies to mess things up.

Apropos family, she'd have to call them again. Easter was coming closer and she'd have to think about a good excuse not to come home this time. In a week, her essay about semantics was due. That'd make a good one.

With a loud clang, the keys fell from her hands, just when she was about to close the door to her apartment. She was late for her lecture, as usual, and she swore under her breath while reaching down to pick up the keys.

Taking three steps at a time she ran down the stairs, her backpack held against her stomach since she hadn't time to put it on her back yet.

The bus stop was already in sight when she saw the vehicle. Arms waving and voice yelling she arrived on time, though the driver was looking slightly pissed... nothing new, there, either.

"Thanks," she said with a friendly smile and stumbled along the aisle. With a sigh, she let herself fall onto the dirty seat, pulling her backpack against her chest. That was close. Trying to calm down, she held her breath and blew it out slowly. But the process was stuck in the middle when she saw a face in the middle of the crowd. A face as familiar as the lines of her own face. His hair was obscuring most of it but this time, Cleo was sure. Staring back at her through the crowd kinda gave him away.

The wrinkly face of an old woman threw her an irritated glance and Cleo realized she was standing, her hands pressed against the cold and greasy window. She couldn't move though she was barely resisting the urge to yell "Stop the bus!"

"Are you well, hun?" The old lady asked and Cleo fell back in her seat, missing the energy to stay upright. "You're looking like you've seen a ghost."

"You've no idea," Cleo mumbled, her heart beating an erratic tact that had nothing to do with the sprint to the bus.

oOoOo

Lectures were held in a foreign language this day. The words bounced back from Cleo's brain like her father's bees and flowers speech from sixth grade. Ten minutes after she had arrived for her first lecture, she realized it was the wrong one. She skipped it and sat down on a bench in front of Stevenson Hall, holding a book in her arm to pretend reading. But her eyes never met the words. Watching the people go by, none of them was Sam. No face in the crowd, no face behind closed windows. And again she started to think she had imagined all of it. Just like she had a hundred times before.

Why, though? That was another question. It's not like she missed him. They didn't share an undying love, not even the same interests. But he had somehow touched her without physical contact, leaving behind a piece of her that felt colder without him. It was the moment of perception, a change of her life that she'd shared with him. Nothing had ever been the same. Like waking up to a new life with nothing to hold on except for this one face. Like the little blonde doll in a little girl's life making moving to another town bearable. New friends came and went, new situations and new places. But wherever Cleo was, his innocent face accompanied her. His simple I'm sorry. As if he wanted to excuse the horror in the world. As if it was his fault.

"Hey, secret keeper."

She blinked and the day suddenly seemed brighter, the sun harsher.

"You gotta work today?"

Brandon, a guy from her study group, stood in front of her, waving his fingers inches from of her nose.

"Stop that!" She ordered. "You stink."

"Tell that to McDoofus. Got the smelly onion shift this week." The young man grumbled and put his hands in the pockets of his jeans. Next to him stood Phil, a young man with the near bald head of a fifty-year-old. The hair must have vanished making place for the huge amount of wisdom in his head. Calculating PI to the 248th digit just wasn't natural. And he'd only stopped, because no book or computer could validate his numeration. It was quite the conversation piece at parties.

"Who did you piss off this time?"

"No one," Brandon said a little bit too hasty and rolled his eyes. "Well, the idiot asked for it."

"Yeah, you keep saying so." Grabbing her backpack and the unread book, Cleo stood up.

"So, do you?"

"Do I what?" Her clock told her it was nearly one pm She had a little more than an hour before her syntax lecture. Time to get a salad, start the stupid essay and maybe restock her holy water in the small chapel between Hollow Oak and the university administration bureaus. Geez, when had she started putting that in her day schedule?

"Work."

"Oh... uh no."

"Great! Study group at five in the library."

He winked and, with a grimace, sniffled on his fingers. "Gotta go, wash my hands with turpentine."

A small laugh escaped her lips but it felt stiff and awkward. Like a heartburn after too much ice cream. One last time, she did a 360 degree sweep and made her way towards the canteen. Maybe she was becoming paranoid.

Or just lonely and insane. Which was pretty much the same, anyway.

oOoOo

The library, though quiet and sober and kinda awe-inspiring, gave Cleo the creeps. Bookcases covered the walls, taking away the slim chance to see daylight in the everlasting twilight. Buzzing light bulbs sent yellow flickers into the reading areas. More bookcases were arranged to create narrow corridors and niches. Sometimes she felt like entering a place where no man has gone before. Dust danced in the air, filling her lungs. Taking drinks into the library was forbidden, but most of the students did it anyway. Otherwise there would have many explainable deaths within these halls caused by spontaneous asthma attacks.

Somehow, the silence in a library always differed from any kind of silence Cleo had encountered. It was filled with the murmur of students and the soundless whisper of the books, as if the written words had developed an unseen existence and read themselves to each other.

Still, the hollow sound of her soles was loud when she entered the main hall, leading to the numerous sections. There was Myths and Sagas, The Middle Age or the department for foreign languages. Without hesitation, she crossed the area aiming towards Linguistics. Lu was already flirting shamelessly with Brandon. All the Sex in the City episodes weren't good for her.

Without greeting, Cleo slumped on a creaking and anatomically lethal chair. "Where's PI?"

"Feeding his freaky head with stuff," Brandon answered and Lu giggled, as if he'd just cracked the joke of the day.

"What are we studying?"

The two shrugged their shoulders and returned to the state of staring in each other's eyes. So, no actual learning for them.

"Oookay." Did she sound pissed? No? "I'll go. Do something productive. Like drowning my disgust with a soda."

"Yeah you do that. Sounds nice."

They probably didn't even realize it when she left them alone again.

She found PI between the aisles Ecopsychology and Evolutionary Psychology and for a fleeting moment he looked like Sam. Sam without hair and a couple decades older. But his stance was the same. His bald head bent over a gigantic book that he had to hold with both hands. The world around seemed to fade away, as if he wanted to drown between the pages. No wonder he was a genius with the attitude of a man who found a cure for cancer.

"Hey," she greeted him and he actually jumped. His eyes were unfocused when he looked up and his skin sweaty. He bit his upper lip and Cleo smiled amusedly. "What's wrong? You're not reading Playboy, are you?"

He grimaced and closed the book. "No." He put the book back with more force than necessary and she got a glimpse of the title The Mind is a Motor by a Dr. Roman K. Winter.

"So, you wanna change your study subject?"

"What?" His face expressed utter horror and slowly but surely, Cleo started to believe he HAD been reading Playboy.

"What's so interesting?"

She took the book and out of the corner of her eyes she saw PI trying to grab it. But she already had it clapped open and stared at the pages.

"Well, that's new."

They were empty.

The paper sparkled white and clean, like it had never been touched before. Or looked at. Or printed on.

"They are empty." Stating the obvious, she turned towards PI, who looked like he was having a heart attack. "PI? You okay?"

There was a loud crack and she ducked automatically. Little lights rained down on her like glowing snowflakes and she looked up at the lamp, which had exploded. Must have been a power burst or something.

"Is everyone okay?" Someone yelled from behind the bookcases and Cleo was about to reply with a witty answer when the floor started shaking beneath her feet. Blindly searching for support, she groped for the wooden shelves and heaved herself up.

Her eyes started adjusting and she saw PI, his whole body pressed against the wall behind him.

"PI?" Carefully she approached, afraid to startle him. But he didn't acknowledge her at all. With a painful sound he sank down on his knees and held his head between his arms like he wanted to keep it from falling off. "PI, what's wrong?"

"I..." He growled. "I can't..."

"What? What's wrong?" She was close enough to touch him and so she did, but was yanked away by an unseen force. Her back collided painfully against the corner of a bookshelf and she slid down on the floor in a heap. The movement woke bad memories and she rolled away as soon as she found her equilibrium and got back on her feet, ready to run if there was something to run from.

While the floor kept quaking, PI was still kneeling and the bookshelves started to sway dangerously. First one, then more. Books skidded from their inherent spots and crashed on the ground, their pages ripping and rustling. Panicked voices echoed from somewhere in outside this section and Cleo was alarmed by the fact that the phenomenon wasn't restricted to the close vicinity.

An earthquake, perhaps.

PI screamed, his eyes wide open and with such pain in his voice. Cleo's blood ran cold.

Maybe not an earthquake, after all.

"Cleo! PI? Where are you guys?"

She identified Brandon's voice and it was followed by a ridiculously girlish shriek which only could have been Lu.

"We're here!" She answered without taking her eyes of PI. His scream had stopped but his mouth was still open, like the sound from was cut off.

"We gotta get outta here!"

Brandon had reached them, yelling over the racket going on. She wanted to tell him to run, to save his own life, but it sounded a little bit too melodramatic.

The world around her still tilted and tumbled and flipped fucking somersaults like they were olives in a martini. Shaken, not stirred. There was a shattering boom behind her and she realized the first shelf had fallen victim to the shaking floor. Like dominos, the other ones followed swiftly, creating a hell of noise and screams and explosions.

And then...

"Hell, Sam! There's a party and we weren't invited."

Her head spun so fast, she swore she could hear a popping noise in her neck. Was it possible to sever one's head by turning it really, really fast?

"Sam?"

No one could have possibly heard her breathless whisper but the man himself, who caught her eyes and took them captive, the moment burning in Cleo's mind as indelibly as a tattoo. Everything was squeezed into this one millisecond. His face, the curve of his lips, the hair that was falling in his eyes like he still wanted to hide behind them.

"Sam! It'd be nice of to join our little rescue, man." Dean stepped into Cleo's field of vision, his arms stretched out in front of him and a shiny black gun in his hand. It would have looked more intimidating if he hadn't swayed like a drunken sailor in sync with the shelf behind him.

"Dean," Sam intervened, throwing his brother an unhappy look. "Aiming your gun at him won't help the matter."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Call it insurance."

Now it was Sam's turn to roll his eyes, but he let it go and stumbled closer to Cleo. Without saying a word, she nodded, telling him that she was okay and he turned towards PI, his hands stretched out in a non-threatening gesture.

"Phil?" PI was visibly shaking. His arms still protectively wrapped around his head he blinked confusedly.

"Go away!"

"It's okay, Phil. We want to help you." Sam's soothing voice cut through the ongoing hubbub like honey in bitter tea and Cleo was sure the shaking lessened a bit.

"You... you can't!" PI yelled.

"We can." Slowly, carefully, Sam inched closer, step by step. Since he was positioned directly between PI and Cleo now, she had to lean to the side to look at the scene.

"Lasst mich verdammt noch mal in Ruhe!" PI screamed and Dean looked at his brother.

"Please, WHAT?"

"I think he told us to leave him alone." Sam answered and mentally Cleo congratulated his guess. PI had taken a few lessons of German last semester. But why would he speak German? Now of all times?

"Okay, okay. We will. But only if you calm down. Understood?"

PI curled even more and started to whimper when the air seemed to grow heavy with anticipation. Like the fresh air before a storm was coming. Everything grew quiet and the dancing bookshelves lay quiet in their crumpled chaos. At least until the shelf boards shot out of their mounts and started to sail around the hall. Remaining books that hadn't found their way to the floor yet, fell down and covered the ground around Cleo with a layer of paper and ink while the boards whizzed around like fucking bludgers.

"Down!" Sam yelled and he ran towards her, taking her with him when he let himself fall. He was lying half on top on her and his arm covered her head, keeping it safe from the ravaging pieces of wood. Time seemed to stretch into eternity and finally it was Sam, who scuffed her lightly on her shoulder.

"You okay?" he asked and she sat up.

A blurry puddle of white from a torch brightened the darkness around her and somewhere a light was switched on. Voices yelled, asking if someone was hurt.

"Why is it..." Cleo asked. "... that whenever we meet, there seems to be flying wood involved?"

He didn't laugh, didn't grin. He didn't even look at her.

His concentration was on the place, where PI had stood and now there was nothing. Dean, the gun still trained on the empty place, spoke first.

"What the hell?"

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: see Chapter One

A/N: vision!Sam (Yeah! Don't you just miss this?)

A/N2: Sequel to Hello Goodbye, where Cleo is introduced. Go read it first! This story was inspired by the inkworld saga from Cornelia Funke. My greatest thanks goes to geminigrl11 as usual. She's a wonderful beta. Remaining mistakes are all mine.

A/N3: Why can't you just pronounce PI like pee? This story would have been much funnier if you would!

A/N4: Feedback would be nice for a change.

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Chapter 2

There'd be a bruise decorating her upper arm where Sam held her during their escape from the building. She stumbled and he caught her before she even had the chance to throw her arms forward. Everywhere, people panicked and ran to the exits. Cleo wished she could panic with them but a weird calmness had settled down in her mind. Like it wasn't really her running from her friend who had triggered a freaking earthquake.

They finally reached the main exit and stepped into the late afternoon sun.

"So..." Dean began when they were far enough from the crowds so no one could hear them.

"Soooo..." he repeated, after neither Sam nor Cleo had realized he had spoken. Emphasizing his statement by clapping his hands, he alternately stared at Sam and Cleo. "I'm hungry. What about you?"

"Hungry?"

"Yes, Sam. That's when your stomach's empty and growls and demands a burger."

"Dean!" Sam replied in a 'be serious' voice and cocked his head. "We gotta question the witnesses. We gotta search for the kid. We..."

"...can't do anything right now, Sam!" Dean answered and spread his arm. In fact, the campus was more crowded than Union Square on New Year's Eve. Police and firemen were bustling like rabid bees, students goggling, staring, taking freaking photographs for their freaking photo albums.

"Guys, aren't you kinda... fugitives?" Cleo whispered the last word and Sam was finally convinced. Together, they left the scene with their heads down, trying to figure out their next steps.

The walk gave Cleo the chance to take some careful glances at Sam. First of all, he had grown ridiculously tall. She wasn't exactly short with a body height of 5'7. But he was huge, nearly a foot taller than her. His face was narrower than it had been when he was a kid, the boyish features replaced by sharp lines. Not haggard but tired. Like the weight of the world pressed against his gigantic frame, elongating it until there was nothing left but a thin thread of nervousness. Walking beside her, he had his hands pushed deeply into the pockets of his jeans and kept looking sideways. As if he expected an ambush any second. Which wasn't that far from reality. Because his brother was a fugitive and Cleo helped him get away.

She was so screwed.

They turned a corner and Dean walked determinedly to a black, slightly sleazy looking car, opened the doors and reached over to unlock the doors for Sam and her. She crawled into the rear and slumped down. The leather was cold beneath her, making her skin crawl, and she skidded forwards to lean her arms on the backrests of the front seats.

"You know, guys, if you wanted to visit me, you just could have called," she joked half-heartedly and wondered at the same time how she had gotten in this mess when only that morning, her greatest worry was being late for the lecture. "Now what?" she wanted to know. Dean answered with the turn of the ignition and a loud rock song started blaring out of the speakers. Sam turned down the volume and looked at Dean, his face as questioning as her own.

"What?" Dean said and snaked his way into the slow-going traffic. It was half past six in the evening but New York's rush hour tended to last twenty-four hours a day. Dean gave his horn a good push. "This's so not my gig, Sammy," he rambled on. "You wanted us to come here... from California, no less." In the rear-view mirror Cleo could see his eyes meeting hers and he didn't look happy. Perfect way to make her own happy bubbly feelings for seeing Sam jump out of the window and fall into the garbage truck rattling beside them.

Sam blinked at her apologetically over his shoulder.

"Sorry, the next time I wait in line for special abilities I'll ask for teleportation," the younger brother replied exasperatedly, and went back to staring out of the window.

She wanted to ask, what he'd meant with the _special abilities_ but an uncomfortable silence had stretched between them and the decrease of adrenaline in her body made Cleo jittery. Goosebumps trailed over her skin and she rubbed her arms to keep the warmth inside. In the rush, she'd totally forgotten her backpack and her jacket in the library.

"Great!" she huffed when she realized this. "I lost my backpack."

"That's okay. The police will probably collect the stuff and give it back to you," Sam tried to reassure her but it didn't really work.

She crossed her arms over her chest and he finally turned around, looking at her with a worried expression. "Are you really okay? Are you cold?"

He didn't even wait for her answer, but peeled out of his own jacket, which was warm with his body heat when Cleo put it around her shoulder. It smelled strongly... in a good way. Like car and leather and musk.

"Can we drop you off somewhere?" Dean asked, followed by another loud honk. He looked stressed.

"He doesn't like big cities," Sam explained with a small grin. "Too many car accidents."

She nodded and leaned back again. The car swayed, gave a jolt and Dean started a waterfall of swear words directed to the small Toyota parking second row.

"Lost my keys," she finally answered Dean's question. "Lu's probably not home yet either. So... no. I've nowhere to go." It sounded more dramatic spoken out loud and she coughed embarrassed. "How did you know I was here?"

Sam turned back to the street and now it was his turn to look sheepish.

"We didn't, actually. We knew about your friend."

"Pi?"

"Pie? What kinda name is that?" Dean mumbled. "No wonder he's going all Mathilda."

"Not P...I...E, but P...I. It's a number. A mathematical constant. You know, like Euler-Mascheroni."

"See, I knew it was something to eat," he retaliated, wriggling his eyebrows. "Hmm, macaroni." He had barely said the words when he twisted the wheel sharply and parked, half on the curb, in front of a small dinner. He got out of the car without another word and stuck his head back through the door, when neither Sam nor Cleo followed him. "You guys coming or what?"

Five minutes later, they were seated in a booth in the far corner of the dinner, which was semi-crowded with a mix of mothers and their children, a few CEO-types wearing expensive looking suits and sipping from their cups of coffee now and then and a small group of young people, talking heatedly over their milk shakes.

"You ready to order?" A middle-aged woman had suddenly appeared next to their table like from thin air, startling Dean, who was bent over the menu.

"Hey..." he croaked and his face fell a little, when he found out the waitress was overweight, with orange hair and a lipstick redder than dead man's blood. A nametag that read Melissa was pinned at her oversized bosom. "Uhh... yes. The Supper Special please."

"Not before seven pm." Her manicured thumb pointed towards a large sign over the counter.

Supper Special, Burger with Fries, Coke or Beer and Dessert of your choice, Eight Dollars, every night at seven.

"You're kidding, right?" Dean made a grimace and took a look at the clock next to the ad. "It's ten to seven."

"Not yet seven, boy," the waitress grumbled in a bored voice. "So, you want anything else?"

"Ask again in nine minutes," he pointed out with a death glare, which the waitress accepted with a shrug of her shoulders.

"Is everyone in New York insane?"

He met Sam's and Cleo's irritated gazes.

"What's wrong with you guys?" he said with a grim face and Cleo felt the urge to shove a barbecue fork in his hand.

It felt weird, sitting with the boy--actually the two boys from her past--in a random diner in the middle of New York City. Until now, there hadn't been much time to process what had happened but now quite suddenly, questions started to waterfall from her brain and she had barely time to pick one before her mouth opened. Maybe she should make a list so she wouldn't forget one... where was a pen and a Post-It when you needed one?

"You said, you'd know about PI." She ignored Dean's smirk. "How could you know this would happen?"

"It's complicated," Sam replied, shifting uncomfortably on his chair.

"I want a cent for every time someone says It's complicated." She rolled her eyes. "You don't just barge in a library, running towards a guy who makes books dance around like the gum balls in the Bravia ad by accident."

Dean ogled longingly at the clock and sighed. Still five minutes to go. "It's what we do. You know that."

She'd almost missed his words but when she did, her head shot upward and she stared at him. "Actually, I know nothing. I had so many questions but no one to ask." She hated the way her words sounded bitter.

"I'm sorry," he said and she shook her head with a smile.

"Don't be sorry. I didn't want a sorry for the first time, so don't gimme that crap." Now it was Dean's turn to stare at her and she suppressed a snort at his puzzled expression.

"I'm... " Sam began but snapped his mouth shut. "Look, I didn't mean to leave you behind like that. But it's..."

"I know, don't say it. It's complicated."

Sam shrugged, directing a soundless plea of help to his brother who was busy staring at the clock as if he could make it go faster by sending out waves of hunger.

"Guys, could we please just concentrate on this pie-guy?" Dean interjected.

"Stop calling him pie, his name is PI."

"How do you know the difference? Pie - PI. It sounds the same," Dean tried to defend himself.

"It's just... I know. You look like you want to take a bite of the edge of the table when you say his name."

"I do... what?" Dean looked at the greasy table. "I'm not that hungry. What do you study anyway? Don't tell you are studying shrinkism!"

Cleo laughed. "There's no such thing as shrinkism. And no, I don't study psychology but linguistics."

He shuddered. "I think that's worse." Mercifully, the waitress came back in this moment, posing in front of their table and tipping her pen repeatedly against her notepad.

Dean rolled his eyes at her ignorance stated with a loud voice. "The Supper Special, _please_?"

"Power failure. No electricity in the kitchen. Anything else?"

Dean's ears turned a dark shade of red and his nostrils flared. It would've been frightening, if Sam hadn't pressed his closed fist against his lips to hide an amused snicker.

"Coffee. Black." Dean finally announced and the waitress opened her mouth for a probably not very friendly reply. "No wait, that'd require a coffee machine. Gimme a sandwich and a coke."

She waited one more second but when Sam and Cleo didn't order anything, she stomped off.

"What about PI? What did he study?" Sam asked when she was gone.

So they were back to the actual problem. "Psychology," She answered and Dean coughed "I knew it."

"What happened before we... found you?" Sam leaned forward to rest his elbows on the table and he looked strangely grown up. Professional. As if he had done that before, questioning witnesses. Like Horatio on T.V., only more charming.

"He read a book..." Something in her memory made her scrunch up her face. "... which was really weird."

"Yeah, because reading a book in a library is potential scary movie material."

"Dude," Sam pressed. "Do you sometimes think before you speak?"

"I speak fast and thinking needs time." Dean said and scratched his head. "So that'd be a no."

"Guys," Cleo interrupted. "That's not what I mean. The book ... was empty."

"Empty?" This little piece of information had obviously spiked the younger brother's interest.

"Yeah, there was nothing on the pages. Like it had never been written at all."

Silence. Then a delighted sound ("Finally!") from Dean as a sandwich and a coke was positioned in front of him.

"Blank pages, huh?" Sam contemplated and Cleo waited for him to scratch his chin thoughtfully, which unfortunately he didn't. "What about him? Was he... you know... normal?"

What the hell was the definition of normal in Sam's world?

"Define normal," she started to say. "No, better yet, don't. But I guess you could say he was... is special."

This earned a furrowed brow of Dean, who was looking for the best way to take a bite from his dinner.

"Special?"

"He was really smart. Like scary smart. What do you think where he got his name from?"

Fortunately Dean's mouth was filled with food and he was denied another smart ass comment.

Of course, Sam's answer turned out much more intellectual. "He could recite PI?"

"At least to the 200th-or-something digit. It was amazing. He could read a book and just like that... whoops... he knew all about it. Like he downloaded the words right into his brain."

"Sammy, he must be nearly as smart as you are."

A traitorous bang came from under the table and Dean made a painful noise, half a tomato hanging between his lips. "Mngh'Ouch!"

Rolling his eyes, Sam turned back to Cleo. "Since when did you know him?"

"PI? We started college together. That was two and a half years ago. Why?"

"What was he like? I mean, do you know if he only got this smart, say... two years ago?"

A loud clattering noise came from the diner's kitchen and Cleo jumped in her seat, feeling childish for letting a fallen tablet make her skittish. A question. Sam had asked her a question.

"Uhm... he was really shy. I think he thought he wouldn't make it since he barely made it through high school." She chuckled "Well, that's what he told us. But I guess..." - and frowned when she met Sam's thoughtful eyes. "You think this some kind of... clue, don't you?"

"Don't know yet," he said and rubbed his temple. "The language he spoke when we found him, that was German, right?"

"Hm, yeah. He attended a course last summer. But he only made it to two or three meetings. He said it was an awful language. And really hard to learn."

The plate in front of Dean was now empty and the older brother collected the crumbs with his fingertips.

"Then why did he speak it? In a situation like this of all times?" Sam pondered on and closed his eyes, leaning back against the head rest of the uncomfortable booth.

"Sam?" She asked when he made a small noise. A groan, barely audible. "Are you okay?"

Dean's head shot upwards and within a blink of an eye Cleo could see well-fed façade crumble like a house of cards in a gust of wind.

"Sammy?" His brother didn't reply. "Oh shit."

"Dean? What's going on?" Hastily she slid from the booth and together they managed to get Sam out of the corner. His eyes were closed tight and his fingers pinched the bridge of his nose. "Sam?" She asked. No response, and she wanted to shake him.

"We need to get him somewhere else!" Dean said and his voice sounded pressed, like he wasn't far from screaming his exasperation at the rest of the world. Or at least the twenty-something gaping people in the diner.

"What? Where?"

"Restrooms," he barked at her and it was the shock that made her follow his instructions. Sam's huge frame leaned against her shoulder and if it wasn't for the curious faces of the other customers, her knees would have buckled mercilessly. She tried to throw them an excusing glare but it turned out as a grimace.

Dean had taken Sam's left arm over his shoulder and directed him towards the back of the room. Soon, sweat was dribbling along the curve of her neck and she grunted. It felt like they had walked a mile, even though the restroom was barely twenty feet away. With a kick of his foot, Dean opened the door and heaved his brother into the white room, not even realizing that Cleo had stayed behind, watching him with big eyes through the open door.

"What?" he sneered, carefully letting Sam slide down the clean tiles next to the sinks.

"This is a men's restroom," she squealed, hating herself for the stupid hitch in her voice. The resulting gaze she got from Dean, made her want to stick out her tongue. But she didn't. Actually, she wanted to stick her fingers in her ear to stop hearing the awful moaning from Sam, whose head had sunken down on his drawn up knees.

"Sammy?" Dean asked and knelt down in front of his brother, putting a hand on his tense shoulders. "Sammy, talk to me!" Even though his voice sounded soft and calming, she could hear the fear and urgency between the lines louder than words could have said.

"What's wrong with him?"

"What do you think? He's just peachy," Dean snapped back but before he'd even finished speaking, Cleo knew, he hadn't meant it that way. "Sorry... it's complicated."

Sam chose that time to lift his head. His eyes were directed at his brother and even though he was obviously in a lot of pain, he managed a lopsided smile. It made Cleo's heart jump in her chest and she wished this kind of smile would be directed at her. Alas, the smile changed again and rather alarmed, Cleo watched him bite on his lower lip. A runlet of blood trickled down his chin.

"Dean?" His voice, so small and fragile and in the next moment ... the back of his head connected forcefully with the wall behind him and his eyes rolled back, turning white.

"Shit!"

An ambulance! They needed an ambulance. And a freaking Dr House. But still, Dean didn't show any ambition of calling for help. She felt like she had back in her parent's cellar, while Sam's blood spread over the dirty floor. But this time there was no piece of wood sticking out his chest.

"Dean?" she cried, frightened, and surprisingly he answered.

"It's okay. He's gonna be okay," he answered, like he wanted to convince himself. "Don't worry, I got you." His hands held his brother's head to keep him from hitting the wall again. It felt like hours until Sam finally stopped shaking and spasming. From one second to next, he seemed to deflate under their worried eyes, blinking owlishly against the piercing restroom light.

"Sam?" Dean asked, not yet ready to let go of Sam's head. "You with us?"

"Where else would I be?" he replied and let his head sink down on his arms with a groan. "Ooooh, that so was not necessary."

"What did you see?"

_See?_

"Library."

"Been there, done that, remember?" the older Winchester returned confused.

"No, not the University. Another library."

_What the hell are they talking about?_

"Another one? You mean there are two?"

To her surprise, Sam giggled weakly. "Yes Dean, we're in New York. And New York's got more than one. Sorry to disappoint you." It didn't sound like he was sorry at all.

Dean shook his head and Cleo wanted to hit him. Or complete her fantasy with the fork.

"Libraries..." Dean snorted. "Like fighting demons isn't enough. You so owe me for that one, little bro."

TBC


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer and Notes: See chapter one. Beta'd by Geminigrl11. She's the best! :-)

_Dear Santa,_

_for Christmas, I want a Pony, an IPod, a portable, demon-safe panic room and a book „Commas for Dummies"._

_Thank you_

_P.S.: I know, I've been a naughty girl but humour me, would you?_

**Chapter 3**

"Visions?" The word rolled over her tongue and it tasted pretty exotic, even for New York standards. Scratch that! It was even pretty exotic for Sam's standards and that was saying a lot. "Visions!"

"It's sounds cooler every time you say it," Dean grumbled crankily and gave his horn a good push, causing Sam to complain with another pitiful groan.

"Stop doing that!" The younger one ordered and lifted his hand to his aching head. Dean, without taking his eyes off the road, mumbled something that sounded almost like _Sorry_.

Even from Cleo's limited view in the back seat of the Impala, the sight of Sam was pitiful. Once again, he pinched the bridge between his eyes, looking like it was hard work to keep his brain from leaking out of his ears. The walk back to the car wasn't exactly as unpleasant as their hasty retreat to the restrooms had been, though she could have done without Sam vomiting all over the waitress' feet. Dean, on the other hand – no surprise here - had grinned like a maniac.

"Visions," Cleo said again, shaking her head. "How do they work?"

"We don't know. They just do," Sam answered, swallowing two aspirins without water. "It helps."

"Who? The pharmaceutical industry?"

Dean snorted.

"No, the people we help. If something weird is going to happen, I know it." Sam's voice sounded weary and pained.

"And that's what I don't get. Your head should be bursting with visions. You're in New York City, home of the weird. There are probably aliens from Mars landing in Hyde Park right now. And someone's evil twin's killing his good twin's fiancée, too. Why don't you have visions about them? Why is it about PI, of all people?"

Sam was quiet for a moment, while Dean's hand stopped mid-air before using the horn again. "It's because PI has his own powers," he finally said.

The car swerved to the left and Cleo nearly bumped against the window. They were now passing the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Library for Science, Industry and Business wasn't much farther. How Sam knew exactly which library they were looking for was a mystery she didn't have the nerve to solve right now.

"PI has... Powers?" She shook her head in bewilderment. "You mean like... Carrie?"

"The sequel sucked."

"Dean!"

"What? It must be some unwritten law somewhere. All sequels suck."

"Please concentrate on the important things here, would you?"

"Dude, I'm driving. I can't concentrate and drive at the same time."

Through the windshield, she could see that they were driving directly towards the main entrance of the library. Flat stairs led to an impressive looking, double-winged door bustling with people. It was nearly eight and the library should be closing any minute. Still, she doubted this would prevent them from going in.

"Now what?" she asked, leaning forward to have a better view.

"Now, we're going in."

_See, I knew it!_

They drove around the block, once, twice, before they finally found a parking space that wasn't next to a smelly dumpster. Sam was already twitching nervously in his seat, throwing annoyed looks as sharp as daggers at his brother, whose only worry seemed to be to get his car safely out of this situation.

"You," Dean ordered her in an authoritative voice, turned off the motor and pointed his finger downwards to indicate his car. "... stay here! Don't move!"

Sam had run ahead without looking back and Dean was already following him without making sure Cleo did as she was told. Well, in this case, it wasn't like she'd done anything wrong, right? She hadn't have any chance to protest. Who was he to give her orders?

Cleo shook her head, well aware that she was being stupid. What was she supposed to do? She was the third wheel on a hot Harley. She should stay in the car, perfectly safe and sound, and wait for them to come back. That's exactly what she would've done, if there hadn't been this persistent and utterly annoying little voice in the back of her head urging her to stick her nose where it didn't belong.

She got out of the car and followed, feeling rebellious and sick at the same time. Breaking into a library five minutes past closure probably wouldn't be punished with jail, but still, she felt her hands sweating and her heartbeat galloping when she stretched out her hand, opening the side door with the words "staff only" written on it.

"What the hell am I doing here?" she mumbled exasperatedly and found herself in a hallway, stretching far on both sides. Somewhere, a radio was playing. Sounded like the Beach Boys.

Shaking her head she tried her best to concentrate on her purpose: finding the boys. To make matters worse, _Fun, Fun, Fun_ was now echoing vividly in her ears.

oOoOo

Another library. If she was getting out of this ordeal alive and kicking, she'd never set a foot back into one of them again.

_...Well,_ _she got her daddy's car..._

It was ten past eight when Cleo rounded another corner and stopped dead in her tracks. She found herself in another gangway. Shelves as high as the ceiling stood on either side and went on for at least twenty metres. And at its end, she found PI, sitting with his back against the wall. His hands were pressed against his head, as if he wanted to make sure it was still attached to his neck. It didn't seem like he'd noticed her presence, so she walked backwards away from him, carefully making no noise. In typical fashion, though, that plan did not go as well as she had hoped.

_...And she cruised through the hamburger stand now..._

A squeaky breath, just a small huffing breeze and she froze, dared not to move a muscle.

_...Seems she forgot all about the library like she told her old man now..._

_Oh shit! Why the hell were they called sneakers when you couldn't even be sneaky?_

"Hey, PI!" she greeted dumbly, when she could feel his eyes on her like the heat of a lamp too close to a body.

"I'm..." he began with a voice that was too loud for his shivering frame. "You shouldn't have come. I can't ... I don't know how to stop it."

Her breath seemed awfully loud in her ears, drowning everything but the _thump thump thump_ of her own heartbeat. She opened her mouth to breathe through it but the air was stale, warm and moldy. Like the books around her were rotting away.

_...Fun fun fun till her daddy takes the t-bird away..._

"Go!" he groaned. "Go away!"

Now or never.

"No."

"You have to go!"

"I can help you," she offered quietly and in a hopefully sympathetic voice.

He answered with a gruff laugh and tore at his hair vigorously. "You have no idea what's going on," he hissed. "How can you possibly help?" A sob escaped between his trembling lips and he ducked his head back between his knees. One of his hands grabbed for a book lying next to him and without looking, he slid it closer to his body.

And still, she couldn't get this song out of her head: _...Fun fun fun till her daddy took the t-bird away..._

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw movement behind the shelf. Just a small slit between the books and the shelves but it was wide enough to recognize Sam, who was looking at her. If he was surprised to find her standing here, he didn't show it. Slowly, he put a finger on his lips and nodded his head towards PI.

_Keep talking!_, he said with his eyes.

Keep talking? She definitely felt more like screaming. And hitting herself for being stupid enough to leave the safety of the car. What the hell had she been thinking? What could she possibly do?

Cleo huffed unbelievingly but complied.

"Well," she said, trying her best to keep her voice conversational again. "You could try to explain it to me, right?"

_Yeah, nice plan. Why not invite him for a cup of coffee?_

But as long as he didn't decide to make the inventory go lambada, she'd be safe.

"Look, maybe you should stay away from the..." Taking a good look around her she shivered. So many books. So much knowledge within. So much damage to do with it. Couldn't he have found refuge in the children's book department? "...you know, the books."

"I can't," he replied sobbing. "They're calling out for me. And I have to listen. He tells me to listen!"

Cleo was pretty sure it was a bad idea to get closer, but she did it anyway. In this moment, the lights above her flickered and went out, sending the environment in impenetrable darkness. She held her breath and only let go seconds later when everything stayed calm. No exploding bulbs or dancing books. Just the lights being switched off after a long and busy day in a public library. Unfortunately, the common darkness had a bad way of amplifying every sound, every noise. Even the tiniest fluttering of her heartbeat sounded like the drum beat of Haydn's 94th symphony. Blinking, she forced her eyes to get used to the darkness but only succeeded in making them water.

"He?" she finally managed to say quietly.

At first, PI didn't answer. Cleo could hear his hectic breathing. But when he spoke, it was so hushed, she almost missed it. "He told me I was special. The man with the yellow eyes." A chill gripped her flesh and enhanced her awareness, made her insides squirm with fear of the unknown. Looking around, she expected to find yellow glowing eyes staring at her, assessing her, _seeing_ her. However, there was nothing but blackness, deep and penetrating. And somewhere, Sam and Dean, though they were the only things she couldn't hear. They probably _did_ wear sneakers that were actual sneaky.

"What are you supposed to listen to?" she wanted to know, while at the same she felt eager to end this strange situation.

"Everything. Every word. There are over 616.500 words in the English language, did you know that?" he whispered. "Not counting technical babble, of course. But that's so many words. And it's only one language." He had to take a deep breath to keep talking. "There are 2700 different languages in the world. So many books." Pause. "And they all want a place in my head."

There was a hitting sound and with a funny feeling in her stomach. Cleo realized PI was trying to beat them—the languages, the words—out of his head. "I want them to shut up!" he screamed and Cleo made a step back. Balance in the darkness is a tricky thing and her stomach did flip flops, anyway, causing her to stumble. Blindly searching for something to hold on to, she finally leaned against one of the shelves, her fingers gripping tightly around one of the slats.

"You're scaring me," she replied. "Please, calm down and we can talk."

"I can't," he said.

Cleo wanted to scream, to shout at the top of her lungs. _"Sam, do something!" _But either the brothers had decided to bail or they just like grand entrances. Probably the latter. Hopefully the latter.

Shivers wrecked her body, and they had nothing to do with the cold. She'd left Sam's jacket back in the car, but now she wished she had taken it with her. Her free hand began to rub her sleeveless arms and she strained her eyes anew. The denseness of the missing light had started to lift and she could see the fuzzy outlines of PI... as well as the reassuring presence of two more more people, who had appeared standing on either side of him.

A flashlight was switched on, bathing PI's legs in a bright puddle. He was standing upright, holding the book in front of him like a preacher reading the Bible to his parish.

"Drop the... book!" Dean ordered and from the sound of his voice he felt as ridiculous as he was looking. Two men, threatening another man with a book. Kodak moment deluxe! Of course, it didn't make Cleo feel any safer. A laugh bubbled somewhere below her windpipe and she pressed one hand against her mouth to keep it inside; maybe this way she'd be able to keep her sanity intact, too.

"He's lying, you know?" Sam said but Cleo couldn't see his. "The man with the yellow eyes. He's lying! You don't have to do this," he repeated with more force and a tiny hint of desperation. He was holding the flash light on eye level and PI squinted his eyes against the harshness of it. The colour of his face was oddly yellow, probably an effect of the bulb though it even made his eyes glow a faint yellowish tint. Maybe, he was just sick? Maybe, he was just going nuts? Maybe they were all going nuts? Give him a few pills and everything will be alright.

_...Fun fun fun now that daddy takes the t-bird away..._

Just for a moment, Cleo's brain had decided to deny her all the knowledge she had gained over the last few years. Wiped clean, like the mind of a young child. Innocent and naïve. Except that, in the very next moment, her memory returned, drowning her blissful ignorance in cold reality.

"I know," PI answered, his eyes drawn back to the dimly lit pages of the open book. "I know he lies. That's the whole point."

"Don't!" Cleo screamed. "Don't let him read..." Her voice was swallowed by Sam and Dean's surprised gasps when an invisible force slammed into them, hurtling their unprepared bodies through the air like ragdolls. The flashlight fell from Sam's hand, rolling away with a raspy, hollow sound. With two resounding thuds, Sam and Dean vanished behind the shelves and out of Cleo's sight.

Even though the light was out again, she could see her friend's eyes locked on her face, the whites of his eyes like the only source of brightness in the library.

"It has all been wrong. But I know how to make it right," he sighed and it sounded like an apology.

She was running towards him before she had time to think. She wanted to shake him until he'd found rason again, but a blaze of heat exploded in front of her and she threw her arms into the air to shield her face, skidding backwards, gaping at the flames engulfing PI like he was made of brittle wood.

They licked at his clothes, his hair and only seconds later he had turned into a human torch, the blazes soaring and reaching out into the crackling air, reaching for the defenceless books.

"NO!"

That's exactly what she had meant to say but it wasn't her voice that had shouted it. It was Sam's.

"Sammy, stop it!" Stepping between PI and his little brother Dean barely managed to hold Sam in check while PI didn't move, didn't sway, didn't even seem to realize that he was burning up. With his arms outstretched, he stood still, bearing the sizzling of his flesh in stoic silence, whereas Sam's protest felt like kicks in her stomach.

Grunts accompanied his futile attempts to reach PI but Dean stood his ground.

"It's over. We have to get out of here!" The older man ordered when a shrill alarm rang out and the sprinklers came to life, showering them in a mild drizzle not strong enough to suffocate the fire that had started its destructive conquest against the vulnerable papers. Her feet had glued to the floor and her gaze fell at the book, that PI had held in his hands only moments earlier. It was closed, holes burned into its cover, and without having to look inside she knew that it would be empty. Even the title was only partly visible, but what she could make out did nothing to quell her terror.

_Spontaneous Human Combustion – Science or Fi..._

Too late. It was too late anyway. The smell of burned flesh tortured her nose and she gagged, overpowered by the chaos around her. It felt oddly familiar – her parent's basement all over again. Someone pushed her and she tripped over her own feet until strong hands pulled her back in a standing position.

_...Fun fun fun till her daddy takes the t-bird away..._

"Move!" Dean's voice startled her and finally she found herself back in the corridor, dripping wet and only barely withstanding the urge to puke her guts out.

Leaving behind puddles of water,they hurried along the corridors, following the exact route Cleo had taken to get there in the first place while Dean was watching over his shoulder repeatedly to see if there was anyone following them. But they reached the entrance unseen.

Having felt the fiery heat on her skin, the fresh air hit Cleo like a train, the nightly temperature biting without mercy. Her soaked clothes didn't keep the chill away, and within seconds, Cleo's teeth were shattering.

"We..." Sam started to say but shut his mouth as if the words had decided to travel down his throat again. "We have to..." His bangs fell into his eyes, still plastered against his forehead_, _and if Cleo hadn't shaken like a piece of ribbon bound to a fan_, _she might have found the energy to give him a soothing rub on the back.

"Sammy..." Dean held him in place when it looked like his brother wanted to go back inside. "You can't do anything. Leave it!"

"How can you...?" Sam spit out furiously. "Why? Why does this keep happening?"

She was missing something, that much was clear. Something more than just PI's death had Sam angry... fearful. But she didn't have the heart to ask for explanations right now. Maybe she never would. The only thing she could do was stare at Sam. His eyes were wide and she could have sworn she could see flames rising in his pupils, the sight of PI's burning body engraved in his retina. His brother's hands were burrowed in the front of his sweater, as if he wanted to make sure Sam didn't do anything rash.

What was the good in these stupid visions when they couldn't help them prevent this?

Sam's panic subsided somewhat when Dean moved his hands from his brother's chest to his face, mumbling urgent words Cleo couldn't understand. She felt left out, a glitch in the two brother's sync_, _and awkwardly she turned around so she wouldn't disturb their privacy.

Her face was still wet, whether it was from the sprinklers or... when had she started crying anyway? Well, she had every right to cry – just having lost a good friend and such.

"Cleo?" When she turned around_, _Sam was standing next to her, a haunted expression marring his features. "Are you okay?" He wanted to know and he looked like she should be the one asking.

She nodded_, _but, after a small pause, articulated: "No."

Silence stretched and it was Sam, who moved first. His arms circled around her shoulders and she leaned her head against his chest, felt his chin pressed against the top of her head. Felt the warmth of his skin that was as wet as her own.

"I'm sorry," he muttered_, _but Cleo wasn't really sure it was meant for her.

oOoOo

"I can't believe you left my car!" Dean complained for the umpteenth time. "And unlocked!" But even though his tone was hard, there was no real fire behind the words. He hadn't even used the horn during their rushed escape from the library.

Now, they were sitting in the car. The heat was turned on, filling the interior with smelly, stuffy air. Her clothes were uncomfortable and sticky against her back_, _and since she had entered the car half an hour ago, she'd been scratching the palm of her hand. Like there was something under her skin.

Maybe there was and it would never leave. Like that awful song.

_...Fun fun fun till her daddy takes the t-bird away..._

"I should get inside," she finally managed to say, but her body didn't feel like it wanted to get up any time soon. Her gaze was directed at the front door of her apartment house, mocking her with the light and the seeming safety behind the security lock. On the second floor, the kitchen window was bright and from time to time she could see movement behind the drawn curtains. "Looks like Lu's at home. She's probably worried."

_Who am I kidding? I bet she's watching the reruns of _Sex and the City_. Again!_

"Yeah, maybe you should," Sam finally answered though Cleo had wanted to hear something else.

"Yeah..."

Sighing, she found the energy to scramble out of the car at last, cursing her shaking limbs when she almost nose-dived on the pavement and Sam had to catch her before she ruined her last bit of self-confidence.

"Thanks," she said and turned around. Somehow, it felt wrong to just let them drive away. Maybe she should offer some coffee?

"You guys could..." she started_, _but one look at Sam's nervous demeanour made her rethink her decision. "... give me a call?" Sam nodded and she scribbled her number on a piece of paper Dean had found after rummaging around in the glove compartment.

Sam took it, put it into the pocket of his jeans and got back into the car. "We will!" he promised and it really sounded like he would. He, not Dean though. His older brother was impatiently playing with the gas pedal. He didn't seem to like big cities after all.

The car drove away with screeching tires and Cleo stared, long after it had turned around the next corner. Exhausted, she rang the bell and, on her way to her own room, ignored the endless questions from her friend, until finally locking up behind herself. Without a sound, she slid to the floor, her back against the wooden door while Lu was babbling on.

And then, all of a sudden, she knew what to do. On aching legs, she strode over to the bed, taking the cordless phone from the station and scrolling through the numbers on the display.

It rang. Once, twice... until a tired, slightly grumpy voice answered.

"Hello?"

She swallowed a sob, pressed her ear against the receiver and felt a sad smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.

"Hey, Mom. It's me, Cleo. You know, next weekend, it's Easter, right? And... I think I'll be coming home..."

End


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